The tradeoffs of gun ownership

The United States (U.S.) is the most heavily armed society in the world, with about 90 guns for every 100 citizens.[1] Although the U.S. is only about 4% of the world’s population[2], U.S. citizens possess about 31% of the world’s guns. Guns are easily purchased in the U.S. with little oversight or regulation. Indeed, you can make your own gun using a 3D printer.[3]

The U.S. is unique among high-income countries with respect to the level of lethal violence, particularly gun violence.[4] About 68% of murders in the U.S. are committed with guns (the next highest category is 13% with knives).[5] Gun violence is a serious public health concern in the U.S. Each year there are about 30,000 gun-related deaths in the U.S.[6] In fact, the number of gun-related deaths is projected to exceed the number of traffic-related deaths in the U.S. in 2015[7] The U.S. has the highest rate of gun fatalities among high-income countries—about 20 times the average for other high-income countries.[8]

Although violent crime in the U.S. has been decreasing since the mid-1990s, school rampage shootings have increased.[9] To protect children from school shooters, some companies have designed products such as bulletproof blankets, white boards, and backpacks. The Chief of the National Rifle Association (NRA) said, “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” and that armed guards would make schools safer.[10],[11] However, the National Education Association has rejected the NRA’s claim and said that armed guards would make schools less safe rather than safer.[12]

At least 19 states have introduced legislation to allow concealed weapons on college campuses, but a recent study found that 78% of college students oppose such legislation and 79% said they would feel less safe if faculty, students, and visitors carried concealed weapons on campus.[13] Likewise 95% of college presidents oppose such legislation, and 91% cite accidental shootings of fellow students as the main reason why.[14] Some campuses even have separate housing for college students with and without guns, such as the University of Colorado.[15] Other states have passed laws that allow people to carry concealed weapons in public places. For example, in the state of Virginia you can carry guns inside banks, churches, restaurants, malls, schools, and other private businesses. However, visitors to the National Rifle Association (NRA) Headquarters building in Fairfax, Virginia are not allowed to bring guns inside (although visitors can shoot guns at the firing range in the basement of NRA Headquarters, which has a separate entrance). In the state of Iowa, even legally blind individuals can carry guns in public.[16]

Why Do People Own Guns?

Most gun owners say they use the guns to protect themselves from criminals, for hunting, and for target practice. [17]

Males are about five times more likely than females to use guns for recreational purposes (e.g., target shooting, hunting). [18]

Some gun owners arm themselves because they don’t trust the government to protect them from outside sources, or because they are afraid the government will try to take their guns away. [19]These individuals view the gun as an icon for democracy and personal empowerment. For example, some bumper stickers read: “"I'll give you my gun when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.”

The main reasons juvenile offenders give for carrying weapons is for self-protection. [20]Some youth own guns to frighten others and gain respect, and these youth also have very high rates of antisocial behavior. [21] Especially in youth gangs, guns are used to project and protect a tough image. [22] Juvenile offenders aren’t the only ones who use guns to intimidate others. A U.S. survey found that guns in the home are more likely to be used by men to intimidate women than against strangers.[23]

In the U.S., the Second Amendment allows people to legally possess guns. Some people believe that guns make people safer because they can protect themselves if attacked, whereas others believe that guns make people less safe. One recent study provided the first mathematical analysis of this tradeoff.[24] The model compared two alternative scenarios on homicide rates: (1) a policy banning private possession of guns, and (2) a policy allowing the general population to carry guns. The results showed that a ban of private gun possession, or possibly a partial reduction in gun availability, might lower the rate of gun-related homicides.

Homicides

Gun ownership is the strongest predictor of homicide in U.S. homes, even after controlling for other potential confounding factors (e.g., drug use, previous criminal record, history of violence). [25] Analysis of crime records found that people who had been shot with a gun were 4.5 times more likely than average to be carrying a gun themselves at the time. [26] Thus, guns did not protect those who possessed them from being shot. The increased availability of guns in a community is also related to the number of police officers killed by guns. [27] One additional problem with guns is that they can lead to rapid violent escalations. [28] Similar findings occur outside the home. For example, businesses that allow guns in the work place are about 5 times more likely to experience a homicide than businesses that do not. [29] For example, one Florida man was shot to death in a movie theater for texting on his phone during movie previews.[30]

Research shows that background checks can reduce gun homicides. For example, one recent study found that gun-related homicides increased 25% after Missouri repealed its law requiring background checks, even after the researchers controlled for several other factors related to homicides (e.g., policing levels, incarceration rates, unemployment, poverty).[31]

Although one can certainly kill people with other weapons (e.g., knives), one can kill more people much faster with guns than with other weapons. For example, the same day of the Newtown shooting a man stabbed 22 children in China, but none of them died.[32] Guns also increase the physical and psychological distance between the killer and the victims, which makes killing much easier.[33] When is the last time you heard of a drive-by stabbing?

Suicides

Among people who successfully commit suicide, most used a gun, followed by ingested poisons, hangings, and inhaled poisons. [34] For example, one study found that 86% of suicides were committed with guns in homes with guns, whereas only 6% were committed with guns in homes without guns. [35]People often use guns to commit suicide because they are faster, less painful, and more reliable than other means. (People seeking to survive an attempted suicide in order to get attention will typically avoid guns.) When gun control laws are passed, suicides due to guns decrease, with most studies showing no increase in suicide by other means. [36],[37] These findings apply to countries other than the U.S.. For example, one study found that gun ownership was positively related to suicide rates in the U.S. and 20 other countries.[38] Gun experts agree. A Harvard University survey found that 84% of firearms researchers either agree or strongly agree with the statement “In the United States, having a gun in the home increases the risk of suicide.”[39]

Accidents

One unintended cost of gun ownership is the increased risk of accidents, including fatal ones. Each year in the U.S. there are about 19,000 gun accidents, and about 600 of these are fatal.[40] For example, at an Arizona shooting range called “Bullets and Burgers,” a 9-year-old girl accidentally shot and killed her shooting instructor when she lost control of the high-powered Uzi submachine gun she was firing.[41]Accidents can even occur with BB guns[42] and cap guns. [43]Accidental gun deaths often occur in more rural areas among poorer families. [44] In U.S. homes that contain both children and firearms, 55% of the guns are loaded and unlocked.[45] The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends that gun owners unload and lock up guns to avoid accidents. To reduce the weapons effect, gun owners could not only follow AAP recommendations, but also keep guns out of sight of family members, rather than visibly displayed in glass cabinets or on shelves. [46]

Toy Guns

The available evidence, though sparse, indicates that children who play with toy guns are more aggressive afterwards. [47] In one experiment, [48] for example, 4- to 5-year-old children were randomly assigned to play with toy guns or with toy airplanes. During a free play session, the children who played with guns were found to be more aggressive.

Summary

In summary, the main benefits of gun ownership are feeling safe, free, independent of the government, and powerful. However, the available data show that if you own a gun it is much more likely to be used to kill you (suicide) or someone you love (accident, homicide in a heated argument) than a stranger in self-defense. The costs of living in a society of gun owners also means a substantially higher rate of homicides, suicides, and accidents. To many social scientists, the costs of gun ownership far outweigh the benefits.

[13] Phillips, S., & Maume, M. O. (2007). Have gun will shoot? Weapon instrumentality, intent, and the violent escalation of conflict. Homicide Studies: An Interdisciplinary & International Journal for People who were Spanked as Children, 11(4), 272–294.

There is no correlation between gun ownership and murder rates. When it comes to the rate of gun ownership, that is higher in rural areas than in urban areas, but the murder rate is higher in urban areas. The rate of gun ownership is higher among whites than among blacks, but the murder rate is higher among blacks.

Britain has had a lower murder rate than the United States for more than two centuries – and, for most of that time, the British had no more stringent gun control laws than the United States. Indeed, neither country had stringent gun control for most of that time.

Neither guns nor gun control was the reason for the difference in murder rates. People were the difference.
The crime rate, including the rate of crimes committed with guns, is far higher in Britain now than it was back in the days when there were few restrictions on Britons buying firearms. By the 1990s – after decades of ever tightening gun ownership restrictions – there were more than a hundred times as many armed robberies compared to the 1950s.

Russia, Mexico, Brazil all have stricter Gun Laws than The US and higher Gun Homicide rates.
You could compare other sets of countries and get similar results. Gun ownership has been three times as high in Switzerland as in Germany, but the Swiss have had lower murder rates. Other countries with high rates of gun ownership and low murder rates include Israel, New Zealand, and Finland.

Guns are not the problem. People are the problem – including people who are determined to push gun control laws, either in ignorance of the facts or in defiance of the facts.

Instead of comparing countries, let's look at America.
Your figures do not add up or accurately compare to FBI crime data.
And it makes sense that where more private citizens own firearms for self defense, fewer criminals are going to take the risk of crossing paths with an armed citizen.

By far the simplest explanation for the decline in violent crime rates is that the U.S. population is getting older and older, and older people rarely rape, rob, assault and murder others. In addition, incarceration rates have increased dramatically since the 1990s (when violent crime rates were highest).

You're more likely to shoot yourself than a criminal because in the overwhelming majority of occasions where crimes are stopped by privately owned guns, no shots are fired. The mere brandishing of the gun is enough to stop the crime as most criminals are cowards and looking for easy prey rather than a battle. Gun control advocates such as the author of this article typically know this but don't mention it deliberately. A society of disarmed vulnerable insecure people is likely to benefit the mental health industry as well I'd imagine.

Heath states that Switzerland has a lower murder rate than Germany. That is incorrect. The gun murder rate in Germany is approximately 0.2 per 100,000 population. By contrast, Switzerland is 0.8. The USA, by contrast is 3.2.

Japan, where owning a firearm is next to impossible, has a gun murder rate of close to 0.0.

Here in Australia, with our gun laws thankfully tightened after the Port Arthur massacre, the rate is 0.2. The UK is 0.1 - extremely low, and which is why it's a bit pointless talking about percentage increases in gun murders. For instance there might be 10 murders one year and 15 the next - both in the same order of magnitude. For headlines to trumpet "150% increase, blah blah" is plain silly, because the base is too low for the figures to be meaningful

If you wish for the USA to be compared to Mexico (home to the drug cartels) Russia (about as corrupt and lawless and you can get) and Brazil (A lively combination of both) then go right ahead. It's just that I thought you would consider the USA a bit more civilised than those three basket cases.

Frankly, when some Americans are so blind that they fail to see simple facts about the correlation between gun ownership and gun deaths, their logic escapes me. Which is a shame. We see the US as part of our cultural DNA, along with Great Britain. Sad to see such a wonderful place turn into such a slough of despair, so jaded and paranoid that some fool can actually get away with suggesting armed guards in primary schools without getting laughed out of town.

If someone wants you dead you are going to be dead. You can thank a gun for that.

Prior to the use of the gun it would take some doing to make that happen. Now it's as easy as pulling a trigger. No gun you are carrying stops a bullet from flying and action is always faster than reaction. The person who decides to kill you always has the advantage as his/her gun will be out before yours and s/he is not going to attack you from the front. You'll be dead before you even know what hit you and your gun wont even be touched.

If you want protection then that protection has to always be up. So if your using a gun it as got to be out, pointed in all directions at all times and you've got to be able to see and recognize the threat in all directions at all times; or you wear armor that protects you from all directions at all times. The only people that really have the ability to do the first are people with their own security service that essentially does just that for them. The rest employ two methods of armor... Stay out of sight so you don't become a recognized as the target or stay behind some sort of ballistic shield.

In short you wear armor, stay out of sight and hire a security service for protection. You carry a gun to be a threat to others. Guns do little to protect you from another gun especially if it's in the hands of someone who has targeted you.

I know, I work in the field with a gun and have seen its abilities and limits far too often. You may FEEL safer but you're not. If you FEEL safe enough to do things that you normally wouldn't do you will BE another face on the floor.

People may believe that they will BE safe if they buy guns, but they are mistaken in that belief. The research evidence indicates otherwise. If you doubt I read 300+ articles, you can read them yourself and see what conclusion you come to. Several are listed at the end of the article.

People may believe that they will BE safe if they buy guns, but they are mistaken in that belief. The research evidence indicates otherwise. If you doubt I read 300+ articles, you can read them yourself and see what conclusion you come to. Several are listed at the end of the article.

Mr. Bushman-
As one of the people you mock in your article, (because I do feel safer with a gun around) I would like to know the answer to a couple of questions:

1. How many times have YOU fired a weapon? (of any sort)
2. If you have, where did you get your training?
3. With the "300 Peer-reviewed articles" you read for research, why would you choose "thedailybeast.com" as a quoted source? It makes it hard to take this article seriously.
4. Have you forgotten the difference between correlation and causality?

I bring these up because I don't have a doctorate in psychology; what I DO have more than 30 years or responsible gun ownership and use behind me. I was taught responsible gun use (yes, that is an actual thing, despite your apparent bias) at the age of 7. 10 years later, the Marine Corps got slightly more intense about the importance of weapons safety. As a result, I get suspicious when I see an intellectual of your status inferring that I'm an ignorant neanderthal because I believe in having the ability to protect myself and my family. You ARE aware that the police have no responsibility to protect you, right? Warren vs. D.C. 1981, and a SCOTUS decision in 2005.

Had I or one of my peers written the article in the opposite vein, I am sure you and your peers would rip apart my train of thoughts on how vital it is that every mentally capable person understand firearms basics.

You may want to read the article (particularly the last paragraph) of your fellow PT author Mr. Kenrick: "kids-bearing-uzis-and-hard-statistical-comparisons"

I am very happy to hear that you are a responsible gun owner! I wish all gun owners were responsible. Here are the answers to your questions.

1. Many times, on a firing range.
2. Yes, I took an a hunter's safety course.
3. The daily beats article just cited the number of gun accidents. Here is another source showing similar statistics from the CDC:http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/injury.htm
4. Yes, I understand the difference between correlation and causation. I never used the word "cause." The type of research design that yields the strongest cause-effect inferences is the experimental design. However, one cannot randomly assign people to own or not own guns in experimental studies. Some studies have, however, shown that the implementation of gun control laws reduces violent crime (compared to before the law was introduced). I refer you to the work of Daniel Webster, the Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research.http://www.jhsph.edu/faculty/directory/profile/3845/Webster/Daniel

Sir, with all due respect, if someone breaks into your home, a firearm and proper training will give you a fighting chance. You don't need to read 300+ articles to understand that fact. It's not about feeling safe, free, independent, or powerful, it's about the right to own the best tool available for protection of you and your family.

There are authoritarian types who think they know what's best for the sheeple, and so they push their unconstitutional agenda through propaganda like this article. These kinds of individuals would not benefit from gun ownership for five reasons.

1) They would have a bad day and then commit suicide

2) They wouldn't use common sense and would cause gun related accidents harming themselves or others

3) They wouldn't secure weapons or teach their children gun safety which would also result in accidents

4) They're sociopaths who would use their gun to intimidate and harm innocents

5) They would be too tempted to shoot up movie theaters because they're either on drugs or they've been brainwashed to believe that chaos is the purpose of a firearm

The actual purpose of a firearm is whatever purpose you choose for it. A gun can be a collectible or for target/competition shooting. A hunting rifle can be a sniper rifle and a self-defense weapon can be an assault weapon. It's up to the shooter to decide what kind of gun they're holding.

Brad, you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem, and you desperately need help. Having your valuable degrees in psychology and communication means you can communicate to one of your psychiatrist friends that you need amphetamine pills for your ADHD or whatever shrinks prescribe those things for. Pop that stuff like it's candy, and consider going on antipsychotics while you're at it. The healing process begins now. Good luck, I truly hope you get better.

I'm terribly sorry if you don't appreciate "aggressive" comments. My rights end where your feelings begin. If weapons make you feel uncomfortable, then you have every right to publish propaganda pieces where you state your retarded opinions, but word them as if they were facts. Even so, I encourage you to ask yourself,
"Why am I such a small dicked shill who has to lie about the so-called tradeoffs of gun ownership when I don't even own a gun?"

The gun discourse is almost as fascinating as the statistics on the problem itself. This is a common tactic among the pro gun crowd and that is to engage you with armchair psychology and attempt to pathologize any opposition to gun ownership.

I don't know if you've watched the video 'Moral Politics" on YouTube by Prof. George Lakoff, a Berkley linguist and cognitive scientist. It goes a long way to explaining the gulf of opinions seen here. There is no rational basis to explain it and the logic of both arguments is extremely compelling to both parties that support the respective positions.

It is obviously the case though that progress in society and for humanity will involve a general increase in welfare and reduction of violence. As scarcity is alleviated and people become better educated and pursue a wider range of more sophisticated, technical and artistic hobbies, I am sure the attraction of gun ownership will lessen. Ultimately they will be regarded as vulgar inventions by the clear majority of people and evolution will render them increasingly irrelevant to advanced societies with more psychologically well developed (actualized) individuals.

One, all of your "peer-reviews" you read, why did you cite news articles that have no 1st hand research that is peer-reviewed? Why not use and cite the research you read? This makes no logical sense unless the other peer-reviews you read went against your thoughts.

Two, I am one of those horrible gun owners you speak about. Per your article, my husband, daughter and myself should all be dead by now. We have a four year old and guns in the house. (How dare we?!?!?!) But yet my husband nor myself have ever accidently shot someone (even ourselves). We have never had to use force against someone who broke in. We have never had our daughter accidently get one of our guns out. Why? Because they are all locked up in a gun safe without bullets in them.

Three, we are also one of those horrible gun owners you speak about because we kill innocent animals. And guess what...they taste delicious. I'm sure you can dream up a new article about the dangers of a child seeing a dead deer and the life long trauma it can cause.

Your research is very bias and, therefore, not true research as a true research paper would be written with a non-bias approach.

Thank you for your thoughtful comment. Here are my responses to your three points.

1. I cite plenty of primary research in my piece (see reference section at end of article).

2. I never said gun owners were "horrible." I do, however, wish all gun owners were like you. I wish they all locked up guns in a safe with no bullets in them. Thank you for being a responsible gun owner. This is exactly what the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends. Unfortunately, only 39% of gun owners do this.

3. I never said anything about "horrible gun owners" killing "innocent animals." My only comment on this topic was "Most gun owners say they use the guns to protect themselves from criminals, for hunting, and for target practice." I am glad you are able to use your guns to feed your family.

I love guns, I readily admit that ever since I was a kid, even a toy guy gave me an empowering feeling not much else gives me. I have found over the years that this kind of vulnerable honesty is completely blocked by most men's pride. I was very curious to see the tempers that would be heated from Dr. Bushman's stat sheet. Thats all it was, a statistic sheet. It told historical facts. THATS why I was so curious to see if Man's pride could overpower rational. Pride, it's blinding and it draws so much anger. Too bad pride and guns go hand and hand.

Awesome paper and such a great testament to the phrase, "Live by the sword, die by the sword"

The article states: "Australian government passed laws to remove semi-automatic and pump-action shotguns from civilians. An analysis showed that in the 18 years before the gun law reforms there had been 13 mass shootings, but none in the subsequent decade." What is not mentioned: Gun crime has gone way up, after the ban, and citizens feel that the criminals have guns but they can't. I first heard of this from an Australian friend (who's one of the last people I know who I'd expect to take a pro-gun stand) and later saw the hard statistics.

Article is bad because it makes a bunch of causal connections where there are only correlations, and makes arbitrary conclusions from the available data.

People who get shot are more likely to carry a gun themselves? Well DUH, they are expecting to get shot at. Putting the cart in front of the horse.

Correlations with police officers and massacres are based on such low numbers as to make any serious discussion pointless, especially since massacres are caused by media hype brainwashing violent people (look up publications on mass media coverage of suicides affecting suicide rates and think why massacres would be any different) and not the availability of guns, as shown by the fact that they are only a problem in countries with sensationalist mass media.

The fact that businesses and homes with guns are more likely to get a shooting merely tell us that violent / self-reliant people are more likely to own guns AND more likely to kill somebody or themselves. Unless we somehow randomly distribute guns in the population, we can not say that the guns are somehow driving them to kill.

Cherry on the cake is the much quoted "gun accidents" stat. Yeah, US has more guns than anywhere in the world, so it has more accidents... So what? US has more private swimming pools and more accidents than anywhere in the world, too. Ditto for cars, probably. Heck, I'm sure more people fall down the stairs around here than say Mongolia. Does that mean we should somehow ban these things? Any hobby other than chess has its risks, and gun ownership is far from the most dangerous.

The segment of society, who want to ban all firearms, should strongly consider, the people who commit firearm crimes. Only criminals & terrorists, will continue to possess firearms, over law abiding citizens, who will be forced to lose their 2nd Amendment Right.

The anti-2nd Amendment society, also wants to take away firearms, from retired law enforcement officers. I am a retired law enforcement officer. When they remove firearms, from all civilians, they seem to forget, that retired law enforcement officers, are now civilians.

You are correct in noting that much of the data are correlational. One cannot randomly assign people to own or not own guns in experimental studies, which would provide the strongest evidence of a cause-effect relationship. Some studies have, however, shown that the implementation of gun control laws reduces violent crime (compared to before the law was introduced). I refer you to the work of Daniel Webster, the Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research.http://www.jhsph.edu/faculty/directory/profile/3845/Webster/Daniel

Of course, we did not ban cars because a lot of people got killed in them. We did, however, do a lot to make them safer (e.g., used seat belts, car seats for infants and children, air bags, safer seats, stronger and safer materials such as windows, lowered speed limits, etc.). We can also do a lot to make guns safer, such as having universal background checks (supported by over 90% of Americans), keeping guns out of the hands of children by having them unloaded and locking them up.

My colleague Daniel Webster, Director, Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, said that technology now exists whereby each gun is linked to the owner's fingerprints so that other people cannot fire that gun.

Couple more decades of Obamanomics and traffic deaths may be near zero - not because the roads become safer, but because there won't be anyone on them.

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As for correlations between gun laws and reduced violence, such correlations tend to be fake. Yeah, gun violence tends to fall after gun laws are put in place - because it is rapidly falling around the globe, including areas where gun laws are repealed.

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Finally, fingerprinting guns is asinine because it is an extremely expensive solution to a nonexistent problem. There are plenty of places that have very lax gun laws and virtually no crime. Heck even FL, where I'm from, is quite safe. Putting fingerprint detectors on guns in case someone MIGHT misuse them is like mandating everyone wear handcuffs in case someone MIGHT start a fistfight. The cost to benefit ratio is astronomically high.

Submitted by Common Sense Gun Violence Prevention on December 3, 2014 - 2:05am

I appreciate the work that went into putting this together. This article goes a long way in debunking many of the "NRA talking points" that the gun lobby uses to help push gun sales.

I like too that you've provided sources for all your facts. I do agree that some of the sources might come across as...less credible(?)...but, better that than stating opinion as fact, which is what the pro gun side does OFTEN.

While the authors seem honest enough and provide lots of references, they nevertheless fall prey to common errors and prejudices familiar from the annals of anti-gun propaganda, particularly in the Summary section, where conclusions are not motivated by the data.

The most egregious - and I would think the authors should know this - is what's known as the "ecological fallacy", where some average for a group is erroneously projected onto individuals: "[T]he available data show that if you own a gun it is much more likely to be used to kill you (suicide) or someone you love (accident, homicide in a heated argument) than a stranger in self-defense." This statement is false. It's equivalent to saying that if you own a car you are at risk of getting into an accident while driving drunk, even if you've never had a drop in your life, simply because a small minority of car owners drive drunk. The actual researchers are usually careful to point out such limitations, as they're well aware of the common mistake untrained people can make out of it (whether deliberately or not), but the trouble enters in the agenda-driven, faulty interpretation. It's condescending, quite silly and obvious when you think about it, and ultimately it backfires. The people do not like being lied to.

"The costs of living in a society of gun owners also means a substantially higher rate of homicides, suicides, and accidents." Again, not at all motivated by the data, as it incorrectly implies causation rather than correlation. (Also, lumping gang bangers, sportsmen, etc., all together under the blanket term "gun owners" is ridiculous.) Living in a society of Tylenol owners does not determine the rate of Tylenol poisoning; it only allows for the possibility. Similarly with gun homicides, suicides, and "accidents" - the rates are not determined by the number or availability of guns. The "weapons efect" is one of the most absurd arguments. While guns may evoke feelings of aggression in some people, they do not cause people to kill, any more than short skirts cause men to commit rape. In addition, many people report that carrying a gun makes them more cautious; knowing that any confrontation may lead to gunfire is a sobering thought for most people.

"To many social scientists (including your authors), the costs of gun ownership far outweigh the benefits." This is merely self-serving and prejudicial (again with the dubious "gun ownership" classification). There is no hard data on successful defensive gun uses, many (perhaps the vast majority) of which do not involve firing the weapon but only brandishing or "presenting." We do not know how many lives are protected or saved in this way. Moreover, going back to the first criticism above, "if you own a gun it is much more likely to be used to kill you ... " involves only cases where a death occurs, which is disingenuous. Furthermore, the right to keep and bear arms is tied to the right of self-defense, and the crime rate at any particular time is irrelevant. While there's nothing wrong with getting hard data on the subject of guns, the right itself is not subject to any sort of cost-benfit analysis, and so this whole idea of a "tradeoff" does not apply.

"In summary, the main benefits of gun ownership are feeling safe, free, independent of the government, and powerful." This is an odd list of benefits, based on "feelings" the authors believe are false comforts. The right of the people to keep and bear arms is a civil right that supports the human rights of self-defense and defense of liberty. People who own guns for legitimate purposes may justifiably feel proud that they are meeting these responsibilities.

You are correct in noting that we do not have good data on self-defense that does not result in death. We do, however, have good data on the number of gun deaths due to self-defense, and that percentage is very small (

The FBI's data for homicide is self-reported by local agencies and the data for justifiable homicide is quite patchy, with many jurisdictions, some of them quite large, not contributing any data. There is, for example, a major discrepancy between self-reported cases of justifiable homicides by police and cases reported by watchdog groups.

I've had alot of problems talking with people about the 2nd amendment, About a thousand responded to various surveys this year, and I had to take long breaks doing something to recover for the fist six months of it. But I am finally getting something together where they don't decide to lynch me after reading the first paragraph, so I'm learning.

From reading your article on circumcision which helped me making my own I got the idea that you guys were unbiased, when I saw this article on the search results I thought to myself "psychology today, I remember them, let's see what they have to say", what a disappointment.
First of all it talks in terms of "gun deaths" and "gun violence" like anti-gun zealots do, instead of overall deaths and violence, many countries banned guns just to see gun homicides get down but got homicides by blunt force trauma, knife, etc... up, meaning, the human cost of gun ownership was virtually negligible.
Secondary to this, it briefly talks about one of the most common arguments for owning guns that is in the constitution itself, the defense against government tyranny, and doesn't ellaborate on it, even though, the statistics will show, that astonishing numbers of people were murdered by their own governments only AFTER disarming the populace.